Italy's Soccer Situation

Question: How much money did Italy's Serie A franchises lose in the 2000-01 season?

(You can find the answer at the end of this article.)

While the national pastime on this side of the Atlantic flirted with disaster but ultimately averted it, many would argue that the world's pastime collided head-on with trouble — at least in Italy.

Economically speaking, Italy has always been a country with an enigmatic relationship when it came to business. While North America has adapted a "live to work" mentality, it could be argued that Italians have a "work to live" outlook. This mentality has been a driving force in Italian soccer — or "football" for the sake of this article — for as long as critics can recall.

tv killed the stadium fan

What was the head-on collision? The Italian Football League postponed the start of the 2002-03 season by two weeks, to September 14th, because eight of the Serie A clubs did not have pay-per-view deals for match coverage. This revenue stream is and has been the livelihood of the sport.

this is my team!

Just as North American professional franchises rely on TV revenue, football teams are no different. But things differ greatly in that North American franchise owners, for the most part, practice a business philosophy in which the team must generate profits.

Italian owners — like AC Milan owner and Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, or Fiorentina owner and film producer Vittorio Cecchi Gori — rarely buy into football teams for revenue and profit. They invest in them for pride, glamour, ego, and escapism.

fall from grace

AC Milan ranks among the marquee sports teams, one that enjoys a loyal following and can count on other revenue streams like strong worldwide merchandise sales. It has managed to remain relatively unscathed.

In the case of Fiorentina — a team that just three seasons ago was playing in the Champions League, coached by Italian boss Giovanni Trapattoni, led on the pitch by Argentine superstar Gabriel Batistuta and beat powerhouses like Arsenal and Manchester United — the fall from grace has been humbling to say the least.

Since then, Batistuta has been sold, and so have goalkeeper Francesco Toldo and Portugal's Manuel Rui Costa.

early warning signs

In fact, the Fiorentina club's relegation to Serie B last year marked only the second time that this has happened since World War II. This year, things got even worse as it was refused a place in Serie B. But that can happen when you stumble around with over 22 million euros.

Perhaps the Italian clubs should take a page out of American pro teams' playbooks and run their franchises more like businesses. While Italian Football League president Adriano Galliani conceded that "football would be poorer without Fiorentina," all the interested parties understand that the game is in dire straits with almost a dozen teams with no TV deals and the original September 1st start date around the corner.

It was thus no surprise to hear owners ring alarm bells early on: Roma President Francesco Sensi — who was kind enough to lend a helping hand to less fortunate teams — always maintained that "we are not ready to start on September 1st."